Safari Gets Inquisitive
I have always been a bit of a Firefox fan but with the release of Safari 4 including top sites, cover flow style history and synchronised MobileMe bookmarks Apple’s Safari is providing a worthy challenge. One aspect of Safari that bugs me a little is the search lock in to Google. There is no questioning Google’s reign on search but user choice is just as important.
I mentioned this issue on Twitter and a massive thanks to both @dfinney and @jakerussell who both suggested I look at the Inquisitor application. To be as upfront as possible it should be noted that Inquisitor has strong Yahoo links in that they appear to own it. That said the application offers a wide range of user selectable search engines and the ability to add your own.
Installing Inquisitor is simple, download the package (only 1.2megs) and the install process commences on completion. Quit Safari and click through the install process, note, you will have to enter your password to complete the installation.
Once installed re-load Safari and view the preferences (File menu then preferences). You will notice that a new icon has appeared along the top row entitled ‘Search’ click this to set up Inquisitor.
Inquisitor has highly customisable. You can select the default search engine with full region support, in the example below we have opted for Yahoo UK but this could have easily have been Google UK, or even Yahoo Sweden.
The application comes with the ’send anonymous information to Yahoo’ option ticked, I un-clicked this but really it is up to you what information you share.
Click the ‘Display links to additional search engines’ option allows you to add your own specific search options. The application comes set up with Amazon and Flickr that can be easily added but it also allows you to add your own custom searches.
For example you can click edit sites and add DigMo! to list. Enter the name DigMo! and the search address http://www.digmo.co.uk/?s=%@ this will then add DigMo! as a search option on the drop down.
I did note that word associates appears in the default Amazon search option so you might want to change this to the generic Amazon search. Once complete close the preferences window and go back to Safari.
Type your search phrase into the Safari Search box and Inquisitor will present you with a few search results and a number of different options. You can see from the screen shot the addition of both Flickr and DigMo! in the additional search options.
I think with a few more days of adding custom searches Inquisitor is going to speed up the way I search for information on the main search engines as well as my favourite blogging and shopping sites.
For more information and to download inquisitor for free click here.
Inquisitor for iPhone
Inquisitor is also available for free via the iTunes Apps Store. The iPhone version offers some of the capabilities of the desktop with live news searching to boot.
The Inquisitor for iPhone settings are under the main settings icon on the phone and you set the locality setting (as it comes defaulting to the US) to get the best from the App.
Click here to get the free iPhone version.
Your screen shot for the app. has 3 different panels:
1. for the search
1. for options
and 1. for the search engines; I don’t know how to set it up for the first panel ( with the Adobe results and information under the results)……am I missing something?
Thanks,
Al
When you install the application go to the preferences, for section 3 go to additional search engines option ? The Adobe results appeared as I typed the word photoshop ? Do you get the black box of results after installation ?